Family Magic
by Rooey38
Summary: Mr and Mrs Evans has a secret. AU


Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters, towns, or magic of J.K. Rowling's _magnus opus._

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I.

Mr and Mrs Evans, of number 7, Spinner's End, Cokeworth, seemed to the entire world the most ordinary of couples. Mr Evans left every morning, kissed his wife on the cheek, and left in his Ford to make his way to his mid-level management position at one of the small-industrial town's factories. Mrs Evans would stay at home to look after their two daughters.

Now, the eldest Evans girl, Petunia Susan, was tall, lanky, and rather plain-faced with dull straw-coloured hair that she kept perfectly coiffed in tight ringlets. She attended the local comprehensive secondary school with the other town children. She had developed a permanent curl in her upper lip, which when taken into consideration with her beady blue eyes gave her a distinctly unpleasant disposition. This expression was particularly prominent when she regarded her younger sister.

The younger Evans daughter, Lillian Marie, was the _exact_ opposite of her sister in every way. Her loose deep auburn hair framed a pretty face that would inevitably grow to be exquisitely lovely. Her wide almond-shaped eyes were the most extraordinary vivid emerald green that it looked out of place in a grey, foggy town like Cokeworth. She freely gave toothy grins as a child, and later, when she was older smiles that would light up her entire face. It was hardly a secret in their sparsely populated town that little Lily Evans had received an invitation to an exclusive private boarding school in Scotland, scouted for her talents.

However, Lily Evans still fell within the realms of the perfect picture of normality that the Evans family portrayed. What the residents of Spinner's End didn't know—_couldn't _know—was that Mr and Mrs Evans had a secret. They were not, in fact, Mr Henry Evans and Mrs Patricia Evans. They had shed their former names to stay hidden from the world that would scrutinize and persecute them if they had found out that their eldest daughter was _perfectly ordinary_. You see, Mr and Mrs Evans used to be prominent members of an underground society in the British nation, a _magical_ society, as Mr and Mrs Vaisey.

Mr and Mrs _Vaisey_ were pure-bloods, the highest standard for wizarding blood, from old and established families. They each grew up in country manors—a far cry from their small industrial cottage now—waited on by house-elves and being taught a very specific set of values. They attended the premier British wizarding academy, Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, and were sorted into Slytherin House, the house of cunning and ambition. Mr Emerik Vaisey was the younger of two sons, and was thus given the liberty to choose his wife. Mrs Vaisey, who then was still Ms Serafina Rosier, was gentler and more affectionate than her elder sister, Druella, who had married into the notorious House of Black. They met in the Slytherin common room, where they bonded over living in the shadow of their shrewder, more vicious siblings. Their union was considered very respectable and was met with apathetic approval from both sides.

For a time, the Vaiseys were happy, and they were ecstatic when Mrs Vaisey became pregnant with their first child. When she was delivered, red-faced and squalling, the new parents vowed they would protect their little girl—_their precious Petunia_—with everything they had. Two years later, their second child was born—_lovely, lovely Lily_—and everything was as it should be. However, at fifteen months, little Lily had already displayed several instances of accidental magic, from making her plush hippogriff float towards her to shattering a horrid vase when she was throwing a tantrum. Petunia was three-years old and she was disappointingly magically inactive. Her mother fretted and her father said she was a late bloomer, but another year passed, and still nothing. Terrified that the Vaisey elders would take her away for being a useless squib, Serafina Vaisey lied, and lied, and lied. She told stories about her Petunia making her dolls dance and shattering windows and even bouncing when she fell. But she knew and her husband knew too. Their precious Petunia, who they vowed to protect forever, did not have a drop of magic in her.

In a family like the Vaiseys, who prided in their magic and their blood, squibs, or non-magicals, were a disgrace. They would be cast out as soon as it was known. But Emerik and Serafina were not their cold, prideful siblings. Instead of giving their eldest daughter up to the whims of the family, they hatched a plan. They searched through the dark tomes in their respective family grimoires to find a spell, a potion, anything that would mimic the effects of death on the family tapestries. Finally, they came across one in a tattered volume, hidden in a dusty corner. It was designed by a long-dead Rosier ancestor who had wished to run off with his muggle mistress in the early 14th century but had no desire to be disowned. It was the answer to their prayers.

On the eve of Samhain, when magic was the strongest, the Vaiseys were dead, killed by a stray dark spell that destroyed their holiday home and their bodies with it. On November 1st of the same year, the Evans family had moved into their little house in Spinner's End.

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II.

'Mummy, Lily has done it again!'

'Mummy, make her stop!'

'Lily, don't do it! Mummy told you not to!'

'Mummy said you're not allowed, Lily!'

Petunia's protest were most often met with amused huffs from their parents and the delighted giggles of her younger sister as she made flowers bloom with a touch and floated down from high places with no effort at all. What made it all the worse for poor, plain Petunia was that whenever her baby sister performed her ludicrous acts of _magic_, her parents would never truly be as appalled or worried as they ought to be. Instead, they would applaud Lily's_ special talent_ that Petunia had not been blessed with. They would give Petunia little disappointed looks when they thought she couldn't see, as if _she _were the abnormality, the _freak_.

Neither girl knew that they had been carefully obliviated of all traces of magic when they had moved to Cokeworth. Little children didn't understand the value of secrets, after all. But Lily could hardly hide her abilities as her parents could stash away their wands, and the dreadful Snape boy from down the way had told her just enough about magic to get her excited. They couldn't help but be a prouder of their properly magical daughter, the one that hadn't been responsible for their exile from their previous life of comfort and luxury.

They tried, of course. They tried to treat each girl with an equal amount of love and care. But when the letter came on Lily's eleventh birthday, signalling her acceptance into Hogwarts, it only highlighted how Petunia's letter never came. Petunia saw the delight and excitement on her parents' faces when Lily had received that stupid letter and the same resigned disappointment towards her. On the same day, they chivvied Lily to the parlour to speak to her about their background and Hogwarts and magic and how she could not tell _anyone_ that her parents knew anything of magic. Petunia had been left to play on her own, while Lily was taken to a magical shopping district to shop for her magical school supplies. Petunia could never understand, even as an adult, why were her parents never _surprised_, never _ignorant_ about anything that Lily would babble on about. She even wrote to the headmaster, Professor Dumbledore, to ask for a place, just so she could stop being the disappointment in the eyes of their parents.

She was politely denied.

After Lily left for her special school, Petunia thought—she hoped—that her parents must love her best, now. But that thought was dashed when the first letter came, tied to the leg of an _owl_ of all things. Her parents had been very much aflutter and Father had read the letter out loud during breakfast with a flourish. As if she _cared_ what their lovely Lily was doing at her magical school, when she, Petunia, finally had a chance to prove herself to her parents. With only a slight falter in his voice when he read "Gryffindor," whatever that was, Father was grinning in a way Petunia had never seen, and Mother was wearing an expression of such _pride_ that Petunia's heart broke just a little bit more because Mother never looked like that when thinking about Petunia. They laughed at her stories, been thrilled with her prowess, and outraged when they learned someone had dared call their perfect little girl 'mudblood.'

Petunia Evans had inherited a great many traits from her parents. She was prideful like her father, she was precise like her mother, and she was ambitious to almost a fault like the Slytherins that both her parents were. But she lacked the one key element that made her the second daughter, despite being the first born: magic.

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III.

Years had passed. Petunia Evans was Petunia Dursley, now. She had met Vernon Dursley when she worked as a secretary in an office in London. He was everything that her family was not: ordinary, well-off, and most importantly, not enamoured by the freak she called her sister. In fact, he had said, shocked as he was to learn that he may well have a witch for a sister-in-law, that he would never hold it against her for having a freak as a sister. Never had she been more grateful to hear those words. He may have been a little overweight and overly gruff in his manner, but he was a junior executive with his own corporate car. Her parents must approve of him, at least, if not like him.

Nevertheless, it still stung that, when she brought him home to meet her parents, they had only been coldly polite over supper with the same resigned look they had in their eyes when she had not received a letter to the freak school. When she announced that she and Vernon had gotten engaged, her mother only nodded with a look of sad acceptance, and her father had barely acknowledged it.

Quite the contrast when Lily—_lovely, lovely Lily_—brought home a boy for the first time. James Potter was tall, taller than Vernon, with a lean physique that suggested a lot of physical activity. He had a handsome face set with hazel eyes behind wire-rimmed glasses and a patrician nose. He carried himself in a manner that was most assuredly arrogant, and had an indefinable air of mischief about him. However, the one thing Petunia couldn't help but notice was his untidy, dark hair. It made his entire appearance seem careless, despite the expensive cut of his shirt and jumper and the neat press of his trousers. She didn't understand why her parents seemed to love him, when they had all but dismissed Vernon, why they had preened when he mentioned that he was 'of _those_ Potters, yes.'

Lily, being the annoyingly perfect sweetheart that she was, invited Petunia and Vernon to luncheon to 'get to know each other better—I've not seen you since you've been engaged!' It naturally ended in disaster and shouting and Lily's tears (and Petunia's, too but no one ever saw those). Their mother may have forced Petunia to invite Lily and James to her wedding, but she would never go to theirs. It would most likely be another freak show that her parents inexplicably approved of. There would be crying and hugging and magic that were so obviously not present at her perfectly plain ceremony. Just like her thankfully normal Dudley would never be the favoured grandchild compared to the magical miracle that was Harry Potter.

When Mr and Mrs Evans died with an ominous green skull hanging over their house, Lily wept uncontrollably in grief while Petunia only felt bitter tears sting the corners of her eyes. Her hand clutched a letter—her parents' last missive—which explained to her that she _had_ been the disappointment. Of course, they didn't phrase it quite like that.

_We went into hiding for you, our precious Petunia. We couldn't let them take you away. Your defect_—she scoffs—_could have tainted the family name. We didn't want you exposed to prejudice. We loved you and your sister, equally._ Lies, lies, and more lies, Petunia's fed up with them.

The madmen—_'Death Eaters'_ says your sister with a sneer—didn't know your parents' secret, though. They went after them because Lily had to play heroine. It wasn't enough that she had everything Petunia's ever wanted, no. She needed more, apparently. It was her fault that beautifully ordinary Mr and Mrs Evans ever showed up on the radar of terrorists. So, when the letter came that Lily was dead, too, Petunia did not grieve. She was furious, with Lily, with her lying parents, with pure-bloods, with _magic._ And the baby that came with the letter sat there on her front stoop, peering at her with Lily's emerald green—_lovely_—eyes and Potter's stupid hair. She vowed there and then that her Dudley would never feel what she had felt all her life.

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**Author's Note:** This is the first story that I've written for this website that I think I might keep around. To be honest, I'm a pretty rubbish writer with very little patience to finish things that I start, but this can stand alone, I think. The inspiration for this little nugget basically came about when I was procrastinating while studying for my final exams on Pottermore. I don't know about anyone else, but the bit where Petunia rants in Philosopher's Stone about her parents' reaction to Lily's Hogwarts letter and Lily doing out-of-school magic seemed like an opportunity to delve deeper. So, I thought I would play around with the idea that Lily was actually a pureblood and Petunia was a bitter squib.

A part of me wants to continue to add to this, putting in Lily's perspective and/or James Potter's, or even toy with the idea of writing a complete AU where this background I've created for Lily affects Harry's life. But who knows? Like I said, this can probably (and will probably) stand alone.


End file.
